In his address to the association's 115th annual meeting, AAMC President Jordan J. Cohen, M.D., urged leaders in academic medicine to focus on creating a community that reacts more fluidly to future healthcare system changes. "The question is this: Are we in academic medicine ready for the fundamental changes that are coming? Do we have a culture conducive to making the changes needed to prepare our students for the revolutionary new medicine of tomorrow? Others have done it. We, too, owe it to our country to find out how far we can go. Overcoming our cultural barriers to change will not be easy. But we have plenty of leaders to guide the way," Dr. Cohen said. He called on the community to look beyond the long-standing methods of medical education and healthcare delivery and, instead, create environments that will include all academic medicine partners in "unleashing our enormous potential for delivering on tomorrow's promise."

Other items of note at this year's meeting:

• N. Lynn Eckhert, M.D., M.P.H., director of academic programs for Harvard Medical International, began her one-year tenure as chair of the AAMC. Dr. Eckhert succeeds University of Maryland Medical School Dean Donald Wilson.
• Thomas M. Priselac, president and chief executive officer of Cedars-Sinai Health System, has been named AAMC chair-elect.
• The University of Rochester Medical Center was awarded the AAMC Outstanding Community Service Award; it was selected not only for its numerous community health programs, but also for the commitment it has made to educate and train caring and culturally competent physicians by weaving community service into its curriculum.
• Sharad Jain, M.D., associate professor of clinical medicine at the University of California-San Francisco and assistant chief of the medical service at San Francisco Veterans Affairs Medical Center, received the annual Humanism in Medicine Award.
• Haile T. Debas, M.D., dean emeritus of the University of California-San Francisco School of Medicine and executive director of Global Health Sciences, received the 2004 Abraham Flexner Award for Distinguished Service to Medical Education.
• Michael E. DeBakey, M.D., chancellor emeritus of Baylor College of Medicine, received the 2004 David E. Rogers Award, an honor sponsored jointly by the AAMC and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation.
• Cynthia Kenyon, Ph.D., professor of biochemistry and biophysics at the University of California-San Francisco, received the 2004 AAMC Award for Distinguished Research in the Biomedical Sciences.
• Linda S. Costanzo, Ph.D., professor of physiology at Virginia Commonwealth University School of Medicine; Arthur F. Dalley, II, Ph.D., professor of gross anatomy at the Vanderbilt University School of Medicine; Steven L. Galetta, M.D., professor of neurology at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine; and Charles H. Griffith, III, M.D., M.S.P.H., associate professor in the Department of General Medicine and Geriatrics at the University of Kentucky College of Medicine, each received the Robert J. Glaser AOA Distinguished Teacher Award, established by the Alpha Omega Alpha medical honor society.